For it is true , O Lord, that You have made heaven and earth; it is also true , that the Beginning is Your Wisdom, in Which You have made all things. It is likewise true , that this visible world has its own great parts, the heaven and the earth, which in a short compass comprehends all made and created natures. It is also true , that everything mutable sets before our minds a certain want of form, whereof it takes a form, or is changed and turned. It is true , that that is subject to no times which so cleaves to the changeless form as that, though it be mutable, it is not changed. It is true , that the formlessness, which is almost nothing, cannot have changes, of times. It is true , that that of which anything is made may by a certain mode of speech be called by the name of that thing which is made of it; whence that formlessness of which heaven and earth were made might it be called heaven and earth. It is true , that of all things having form, nothing is nearer to the formless than the earth and the deep. It is true , that not only every created, and formed thing, but also whatever is capable of creation and of form, You have made, by whom are all things. 201 Corinthians 8:6 It is true , that everything that is formed from that which is formless was formless before it was formed. Chapter 20. Of the Words, In the Beginning, Variously Understood. From all these truths, of which they doubt not whose inner eye You have granted to see such things, and who immoveably believe Moses , Your servant, to have spoken in the spirit of truth ; from all these, then, he takes one who says, In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth, — that is, In His Word, co-eternal with Himself, God made the intelligible and the sensible, or the spiritual and corporeal creature. He takes another, who says, In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth, — that is, In His Word, co-eternal with Himself, God made the universal mass of this corporeal world, with all those manifest and known natures which it contains. He, another, who says, In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth, that is, In His Word, co-eternal with Himself, God made the formless matter of the spiritual and corporeal creature. He, another, who says, In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth, — that is, In His Word, co-eternal with Himself, God made the formless matter of the corporeal creature, wherein heaven and earth lay as yet confused, which being now distinguished and formed, we, at this day, see in the mass of this world. He, another, who says, In the beginning God created heaven and earth, — that is, In the very beginning of creating and working, God made that formless matter confusedly containing heaven and earth, out of which, being formed, they now stand out, and are manifest, with all the things that are in them. Chapter 21. Of the Explanation of the Words, The Earth Was Invisible. And as concerns the understanding of the following words, out of all those truths he selected one to himself, who says, But the earth was invisible and without form , and darkness was upon the deep, — that is, That corporeal thing, which God made, was as yet the formless matter of corporeal things, without order, without light. He takes another, who says, But the earth was invisible and without form , and darkness was upon the deep, — that is, This whole, which is called heaven and earth, was as yet formless and darksome matter, out of which the corporeal heaven and the corporeal earth were to be made, with all things therein which are known to our corporeal senses. He, another, who says, But the earth was invisible and without form , and darkness was upon the deep, — that is, This whole, which is called heaven and earth, was as yet a formless and darksome matter, out of which were to be made that intelligible heaven, which is otherwise called the heaven of heavens, and the earth, namely, the whole corporeal nature, under which name may also be comprised this corporeal heaven, — that is, from which every invisible and visible creature would be created. He, another, who says, But the carth was invisible and without form , and darkness was upon the deep, — The Scripture called not that formlessness by the name of heaven and earth, but that formlessness itself, says he, already was, which he named the earth invisible and formless and the darksome deep, of which he had said before, that God had made the heaven and the earth, namely, the spiritual and corporeal creature. He, another, who says, But the earth was invisible and formless, and darkness was upon the deep, — that is, There was already a formless matter, whereof the Scripture before said, that God had made heaven and earth, namely, the entire corporeal mass of the world, divided into two very great parts, the superior and the inferior, with all those familiar and known creatures which are in them.
TheoFons